


A Bird by Any Other Name

by startingatmidnight



Series: Wingkipedia [2]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Devil Face (Lucifer TV), F/M, Fluff, Fuckruary 2021 (Lucifer TV), Humor, Sexual Content, Wing Grooming, Wing Kink, Wings, chloe still has a wing kink and lucifer has his own problems in life, i want to be the person who writes sequels that can also be read as standalones but this is not that, macawus interruptus is real and it CAN be a detriment to your devils sex life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-13 04:41:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29521026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/startingatmidnight/pseuds/startingatmidnight
Summary: It’s not that he’s going to do it, but sometimes Lucifer contemplates how exactly he would kill every parrot on Dad’s green Earth.
Relationships: Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar
Series: Wingkipedia [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2168721
Comments: 40
Kudos: 210





	A Bird by Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [venividivictorious](https://archiveofourown.org/users/venividivictorious/gifts).



> I wrote this while listening to a 10 hour loop of the Wii Shopping Channel so if you read it then that’s your own fault

“Detective,” Lucifer says, “I want to be as clear as I possibly can.”

“Oh, great.”

“Over the years, I’ve forgiven you for many of your more mortal qualities—”

“Lucifer, the amount of feathers I could pull out right now? It’s a lot. Just keep that in mind.”

“—But the bird feeder is the worst idea you have ever had.”

It’s Sunday morning, which means that the two of them are out on the balcony, mid-grooming. Chloe is wearing his shirt from last night. Lucifer is wearing a black silk dressing gown and a parrot.

There is a parrot on his right wing 

He’s gotten used to his wings being touched again, but there’s somewhat of a semantic difference between Chloe touching them and _some lice-ridden verminous bird using them as a perch_.

Chloe sighs. “It’s twenty times smaller than you. I think you’ll live.”

Lucifer’s wings begin to tremble with the effort of keeping them deathly still. “Detective, if this poor excuse for sapient life puzzles out that the wings are attached to _me_ , what then?”

Chloe hums thoughtfully. “Well… I guess you’ll learn what it’s like when something pursues you for sex for months on end in weirder and weirder ways.”

“...Right, is this one of those times where you’re using the bird to talk about me?”

Big Bird cocks his head up at the mention of ‘bird’. Lucifer grimaces and falls silent, and Big Bird returns to observing the glossy feathers beneath his talons with interest. 

Chloe, knelt by Lucifer’s side with her hands dutifully still where they’re buried in his tertials, sighs.

“It’s not gonna go away unless I shoo it, y’know.”

“Fine, fine, do what you must. Do you have a taser with you?”

“I’m not tasing a parrot.”

“More’s the pity.”

Chloe wipes off her hands on his shirt— another casualty of his wardrobe to preen oil, at this point he should start a counter— and stands up, waving her hands ineffectually at the parrot.

“C’mon, Big Bird. Go to the feeder or something.”

Big Bird squawks but doesn’t bite at her, engrossed as he apparently is in the shine of Lucifer’s feathers. Lucifer watches in horror as the macaw cocks his head, then looks between the wings and Lucifer’s face.

“Bugger.”

Big Bird hops up and down on the feathers, tweeting excitedly. 

“Pretty bird!”

“I’m sure you’re proud of _that_ moniker, you little _pest_.” Lucifer flaps his wings and Big Bird squawks, taking flight to avoid being thrown. Chloe splutters in the brunt of the wing flap and pulls a strand of hair from her mouth. 

Big Bird lands on the railing. It bounces up and down, cheeping the same phrase from the Addams Family theme tune a few times in a row. It gives Lucifer a precious chance to tuck his wings away before the creature can do anything unspeakable to them.

“Let’s be clear,” he insists, leaning down and glaring at the parrot. “You have been gifted your freedom, in spite of your crimes. You are presented with food, despite in no way deserving our help. The Detective even gave you a birdbath, which ought to be a damnable offence for both parties, if you ask me. The least you can do— the _least—_ is learn to use a _name_. I have plenty for you to choose from, you can take your pick. _Devil. Satan. Adversary to all Mankind_.”

“Pretty bird,” Big Bird says.

Chloe huffs a laugh, tugging at Lucifer’s shoulder lightly. “It’s a bird, Lucifer, you’re not going to intimidate it into obeying you."

“Can bloody well try,” Lucifer grumbles, turning away.

Big Bird makes a chattering sound and takes flight, spearing forward and colliding beak-first with the hand Chloe has on his shoulder. Chloe yelps and yanks her hand back.

“What’s _that_ for?” Chloe asks.

* * *

So Big Bird hates her.

Chloe’s worked in Los Angeles homicide long enough to have a thick skin. She isn’t insulted by a parrot not liking her. It _is,_ however, confounding. _She’s_ the one that fills the bird feeder (an act that results in Big Bird dive-bombing her head). _She’s_ the one that stops Lucifer from thwacking him with a bug zapper (an act that results in Big Bird dive-bombing her head). Not to mention, _she’s_ the one trying to keep Dan from—

Okay, she isn’t trying _that_ hard to keep Dan from doing the aviary thing.

It _is_ kind of funny.

Since Lucifer followed through with remodelling Dan’s bathroom, Dan’s practically been the Devil’s best friend. Chloe knows them both well enough to be suspicious. Lucifer is the living embodiment of ‘more money than sense’ and Dan’s started wearing a Rolex to the office. Still, if it buys Lucifer a better work environment, she’s not going to start getting in the way of things.

Even Dan’s new plan.

Chloe gets the feeling that this plan, which started out as a prank and in recent days has veered dangerously towards extortion, might have been inspired by previous plans. Again— Dan’s not shooting anyone. Chloe knows not to get in the way of forward progress.

And it _is_ funny.

“Spousal maintenance,” Dan announces out of nowhere at a crime scene. “It’s important.”

Ella frowns up from the body. “Uh… okay?”

Lucifer doesn’t look up from his phone.

“You know,” Dan says. “If your spouse. Or spouses. Can’t support themselves financially.”

Lucifer slowly, _dangerously_ slowly, raises his head from his phone. Chloe steels her jaw and keeps the smile off her face.

“This is a _crime scene_ ,” Lucifer says with indignation, gesturing around the bloodstained condo as if his hypocrisy isn’t currently reaching a new and unexplored height. “Shall we keep our personal lives out of it? 

“Sure, man,” Dan says. “Hey, Ella, did you see the L.A. aviary is closing down?”

“Huh,” Ella says, taking a picture. “No way.”

“Oh _no_ ,” Chloe says with feeling. She’s clearly said too much already: Lucifer’s put away his phone and he’s staring at her with open distrust. “How come?”

“No funds,” Dan says, shrugging his shoulders. “The murder kinda got rid of the last of the tourists.”

“That’s so sad,” Ella says, noncommittal. “What’ll happen to the birds?”

Within the week, a charity fund for the aviary has been established by some shell company in Mauritius, and an anonymous donor presents the aviary with enough money to let it run, even without tourists, for _decades_.

That was Dan’s success. Chloe will admit to that. She just gave him enough to run with.

 _Her_ masterstroke is getting Lucifer to attend the re-opening.

Here’s the thing: she thinks Big Bird might hate her because he’s jealous. If Big Bird sees her as a threat to the perfect interspecies marriage that Lucifer and himself have going on, then she’s never going to get peace. However… if Lucifer just _happens_ to come home smelling like other parrots...

Well, it might shift Big Bird’s focus a little.

And also, it’s _funny_.

“Just think of the hot tub,” she says. Lucifer parks the Corvette on a random spot on the sidewalk, shuddering at the sound of birdsong.

“I’ll be too busy,” Lucifer grouses, “Thinking about how _flammable_ this building is.”

Chloe holds up her phone and demonstratively starts a timer. “ _One_ hour, and all your movie fantasies come true.”

“Of all the things to trade it for,” he sighs, getting out of the car. He’s wearing what he claims to be his ‘most expendable’ suit, which is moss-green and as outlandishly expensive as any of his other suits. “I’m starting to suspect your wing fetish extends further than is strictly healthy. I know an excellent doctor."

Chloe's not going to tell Lucifer what he can and can’t talk about in therapy, but for her own sake she really, _really_ hopes Lucifer keeps it PG when talking wings with Linda.

“I just think you need to see your partners more,” she grins, leading the way to the entrance. “I mean, I see you, and Big Bird sees you, but you’re not being fair to the others.”

Lucifer glares. “If life was _fair_ , Detective, I wouldn’t be spending my evening at the top venue for feather mites in Los Angeles.”

Chloe smiles. “Is _that_ why you’re freaking out? You don’t want feather mites?”

“I am _not_ ‘freaking’— _argh_!”

Just inside the entrance, the cockatoo strains at the hold that its gloved handler has on its talons. Its white-feathered crest is sticking on end and it’s squawking insistently.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” the handler says, wincing as the cockatoo slaps its wings against his arm in an effort to free itself. “Dunno what’s gotten into her, Leila’s usually really docile. Welcome to the— _Leila_! Stop that, no _biting_.”

“How horrible,” Lucifer says pleasantly, speed-walking them past the aggressive cockatoo. He looks like a man on his way to the gallows.

Chloe picks up a leaflet as they pass by the stand, and unfolds it into a map. “So,” she says, “I have a question.”

“I am _not_ taking pictures with them.”

Damn. She’d promised Ella she’d get one for the office Christmas card. “Not the question,” she says. “Why _are_ they so crazy for you? Does the mojo work better the smaller you are or what?”

Lucifer sighs as they pass through the hanging plastic sheeting that covers the free-fly section. The muggy humidity of the room is already threatening his hair. 

“Birds don’t have an awful lot of mental fortitude or will. Desire, for them, is less _complex_ than it is for humanity. If I’d considered any of that in the moment, I wouldn’t have let you get your way last time.”

Chloe shrugs. “Sorry. It is kind of cute though.”

Lucifer scrunches up his face in disgust as a rainbow macaw flits past. “ _Cute?_ ” 

“You ever see that scene in Snow White where she gets all the birds to clean the house with her?”

“Detective, you have to— oh, no, absolutely _not_!”

When Chloe had amused herself at the aviary by encouraging Lucifer to seduce a couple dozen parrots, she’d pointed out a puffed-up, sad-looking kookaburra, and insisted he cheer it up with his desire mojo. Lucifer had immediately announced that kookaburras were the worst excuse for sapient life in the entire menagerie of his father’s creation, and had nearly refused to do it.

 _Nearly_. Chloe’s persuasive when she wants to be.

Anyway, the kookaburra had tried to mate with Lucifer’s pocket square (which was later ritually burned). 

The kookaburra, significantly more active than when she saw it last, is perched on a walkway, surrounded by several tourists snapping photos. It wanders to and fro on its stubby legs, head tilted up as it makes the weird laugh-chatter it does.

Lucifer is doing an excellent impression of a waxwork statue.

“Its vision is based on movement,” Chloe agrees, smirking. Lucifer glares at her, making a tiny frantic gesture that, if she’s interpreting it right, is asking her to strangle the kookaburra to death.

She whistles. The kookaburra’s eyes track over to her, and then him. It hops up and down, making a new higher-pitched chitter, opening up its wings and splaying them invitingly. Then it takes off in the opposite direction, disappearing into the trees. Lucifer, whose arms had already shot up in defense, sighs in relief.

“Hopefully it’s gone to sod off and die,” he says. “Is there any way we can live out the terms of the agreement by spending the rest of the hour where the birds are _caged_ , as they should be?”

The kookaburra’s call arrives before it does, but this time it sounds kind of muffled. Lucifer looks in all directions, anxious.

“It’s coming back,” he whispers. “Cover me, I’m making a run for it.”

“He’s over here!” Chloe calls.

“ _Traitor!_ ”

The kookaburra flutters down and lands on Chloe’s shoulder. She laughs. 

“Hey, birdie. What do you have there?”

A muscle ticks in Lucifer’s jaw. “Stay very still, Detective. I’m going to get it off you.”

“Oh, don’t. He’s nice!” she says. “Look how happy he looks, he was so sad when we saw him last. Did your bird husband cheer you up, huh?”

The kookaburra makes an ‘oo oo oo’ sound around the beakful of seeds.

“Can we not refer to me as its ‘bird husband’ here? Or _anywhere_?”

“Why’s it got so much stuff in its beak?”

“Hopefully to choke to death and die on it, Detective, let’s just—”

“Hang on.”

“...Don’t tell me you’re on Wikipedia right now.”

The kookaburra bobs its head at Lucifer.

“Oh wow.”

“ _What_.”

“‘The male then offers her his current catch accompanied with—’”

“Oo, oo, oo.”

Chloe snorts. “—An ‘ooh ooh’ sound.”

“You know,” Lucifer says, faint and pale, “They’re His favourite bird. I never understood what my father liked about them. They’re beige, ugly and loud, there’s nothing to like. I think I know why He liked them now. I think He knew that _exactly this_ would happen.”

The kookaburra turns in a deliberate slow circle on Chloe’s shoulder, splaying its wings as if to show off. A couple tourists snap photos.

“You think your dad,” she hedges, “Made kookaburras especially to marry one to you?”

“So little of my life is my own,” Lucifer murmurs. He sounds a million miles away. “Is it possible that when He said He had happy memories of… that He was thinking of _this_? The manipulative _bastard_.”

“Lucifer,” Chloe says, “I _really_ don’t think your dad was thinking of this.”

“He has a taste for making creatures that serve their purpose after the fact,” Lucifer says, bitter. “Who’s to say that He didn’t set up a practical joke at my expense millions upon millions of years ago?”

“I mean. Me. I’ll say it. God didn’t make kookaburras as a prank. If anything, this is my prank, not his, so I’m not sharing credit here.” 

The kookaburra, whose posturing had only increased in frantic speed since they started talking, flaps its wings and takes flight. Lucifer yelps as the kookaburra goes for his pocket square, flailing his arms. 

Chloe manages to get five pictures of the resulting wing-and-hand slap fight from the snap-happy tourists. Lucifer successfully petitions for an early release in return for letting Chloe keep _one_ picture. She texts it to Ella and Dan before he can change his mind.

“I’m keeping you in that hot tub until _dawn_ ,” Lucifer growls, setting light to his besmirched pocket square on the sidewalk. “This is bloody _lotus silk_.”

* * *

While he’s sure she has ulterior motives with that picture, it’s worth whatever blow she inflicts on his dignity for this, right now _._ She’s admitted to finding this whole idea somewhat awkward and embarrassing, and he’s promised to make it enjoyable for her. He intends to honour that promise and _then_ some, because this, right now…

The bikini was his selection. The screen-accurate choice would have been hot pink, with straps so thin they’d looked like they might snap off any second, but he’s not interested in screen-accurate and he thinks a perfect recreation might make her uneasy. He’d found her something simple, well-fitting. Red. 

Chloe tests the water with a hand, mouth twisting. Lucifer offers her a champagne glass.

“Temperature’s lovely, darling. Come on in.”

She takes the glass with a grateful nod and lowers herself into the tub. He watches her descend; the way her legs disappear beneath the glittering water, red fabric rippling in waves. Her nipples are peaked beneath the bikini top, her hair brushing against it and wetting into curls as she sits opposite him. She takes a deeper sip of her champagne than she normally would, looking everywhere but him. He puts his own glass down so he can reach out and brush her tensed fingers. 

“This isn’t transactional,” he reminds her. “If any of this makes you uncomfortable, we stop.”

She shakes her head, sighing. “I’m not… uncomfortable. I do want to enjoy this, I’ve just… I’ve spent half my life avoiding them, you know?” She watches the surface of the water. “I don’t want to _think_ how many people only know me from how I look coming out of one topless.”

“The people that have the fortune to meet you personally know that your acting past only forms a part of the whole,” he says. “An absolutely _stunning_ part of the whole, make no mistake, but only a part.”

For the first time since they came back to the penthouse, Chloe has a genuine smile on her face. She shakes her head, placing her glass down.

“You really are so… _you_ , sometimes.”

He turns his head to look at her sideways, smiling uncertainly. “I’m me _all_ the time, Detective.”

“I know,” Chloe says. Her smile changes: the light of the evening shines in her eyes. “I like that about you.”

She rises. _Deliberately_ , he can tell by the way she pulls her hair behind her shoulders with one hand, by the way she fixes her eyes on his as she does it. Water runs in steaming rivulets from her body, flickering silver in the hot tub’s lights. Drops glitter as they roll down the curve of her waist, the dip of her collarbone, shining over bullet scars and stretchmarks, catching and absorbing into fabric. He only barely resists the urge to lick his lips. She’s standing before him, _for_ him, flesh and blood and ever-so-slightly divine. 

He wants to tear that bikini off with his _teeth_.

She lowers herself, straddles him. As a concession to not knowing if tonight would lead to anything, he had put on the only swimwear he owns; she looks down at it now and smiles.

“Fourth of July isn’t for ages, y’know.”

He would think of a witty response, but he’s a little distracted by how he currently has a front row view to a sight that ought to have won his partner an Oscar. He runs a hand up her ribcage, her skin cooling where it’s wet and above water, and looks at her unashamedly.

“You’re beautiful,” he says. 

Her hand is warm and damp as it trails against his jaw. Her kiss is unhurried and certain. She grabs the hand he has on her waist and slides it to the back of her bikini top. He takes his time: the string, then the straps, following her lead, waiting for her to growl against his mouth for him to _do it already_ before he takes it off. 

Steam flows from the water, rolling from her body. She is aether made flesh. Her boobs are _fantastic_.

He surges forward, laves his tongue against her. She tastes of bromine and salt. She gasps as he tastes each one in turn. He hooks his thumbs into the fabric around her hips but he makes no move to remove them. 

He moves to her pace, waits for her to be desperate for it, to _beg_ him for it, before he takes the next step. Rubbing her over her clothing, then sliding a finger beneath it. One, then two fingers inside her, the fabric pushed aside. She tries to distract him, speed him up: instead of her usual canting motion, she bounces up and down a little on his fingers, smiles as his eyes track to her chest. She reaches a hand beneath the water and cups him, running her hand up and down the length of him, never quite enough to satisfy. 

“If you want it,” he hums, smiling as she starts to grind against his hand impatiently, head tipping back as she pursues her pleasure, “I want to hear you _say_ it.” 

He loves when she’s like this: her innate stubbornness, fighting against her desire. He loves to watch how she fights with herself: how he can lead her away from her own head, let her follow her heart. He tilts his head, feigns listening for her as he continues to curl his fingers _just_ shy of where she wants them. She moans, and he knows he has her.

“Please,” she says. He loves this too: she loses none of her grounded certainty, even now. The way Chloe begs is only half a step away from how she issues a command. “ _Please_ , Lucifer, I want you inside me.”

He bought her the bikini, so he thinks it’s only fair that he can rip it apart too. The American flag speedos aren’t worth any effort to keep in one piece. He deposits the ripped fabric on the side as Chloe huffs.

“Wasteful,” she mutters. He smirks.

“I can go replace them if you feel so strongly about it.”

“Don’t you _dare_ ,” she says. Her face is pink and flushed, her eyes bright and sparkling. He kisses her just because he can, lines himself up and lets her descend. Their position is just _perfect,_ like this, for her breasts to rise above the water and then submerge every time she moves. He knows Chloe’s hard boundaries when it comes to sex, but it doesn’t stop him from wishing he had a camera to record this moment. He’ll simply have to make it an eventful memory for them both. 

After her teasing, the feeling of her around him, coupled with the unparalleled sight of her as she rises and lowers in the water, is intoxicating. He drinks it in, the heat and light and weight of her, the feeling of her skin beneath his hands, the shine of her eyes as she lowers herself fully. He dips a hand beneath the water; she follows. Their hands bump together as they both, it turns out, reach for the same place: where they’re connected. His breath pushes from him in a harsh exhale. She laughs softly, lifts her hands and settles them on his shoulders. 

The pace they set is languid and enthralling. There’s no hurry tonight: they have nowhere to be but right here. Chloe’s hair dips into the water as she moves, curling and tangling and sticking to her chest. She smooths her hands down his chest, over his shoulders, to the back of his neck. He thinks by the halting motion of her hands that she might be trying to draw constellations in the freckles on his skin. 

He lets himself explore her: memorising her piece by piece, enjoying all the parts of her that he rarely gets to touch. He traces the curve of her jaw, the outline of her lips. Her mouth opens to let him in, her tongue flickering across the pad of his thumb, and he shudders minutely in the heat and warmth and friction of it all. She—

“Pretty bird!”

Chloe jolts in surprise, breasts bouncing in the water, dropping and tightening around him, biting down a little on his thumb, and that clashes together with the _phrase_ and—

“ _No_ ,” he gasps, closing his eyes as if it’ll stop what’s already happening. He cannot believe this is happening. He’s had some shameful orgasms in his life, but this is just one step too far. He should never have left Hell.

Chloe lifts off of him, stands up in the hot tub, leans forward, takes a deep breath, and then spins around and whips the ripped speedo at Big Bird. The macaw squawks indignantly as Detective Decker’s unparalleled aim finds its mark, toppling backwards from the edge of the hot tub. There’s a scrabbling sound, a flapping of feathers, and Big Bird takes off again, flying away.

Lucifer sits up in the hot tub, willing Chloe to have suddenly developed complete amnesia.

“Okay,” Chloe says, turning back, blinking rapid-fire. “Uh. _Wow_.”

“That parrot,” he announces, “Has outstayed its welcome.”

* * *

Chloe knows that Lucifer’s just trying to cover extreme embarrassment behind a six-hour brainstorming session on how best to discourage Big Bird from visiting the penthouse, but she’s starting to wonder how he ever ruled the number one destination for torture. Lucifer’s whiteboard includes the phrase ‘bird poison’.

Finally giving up on work as Lucifer mutters to himself at the whiteboard, she sighs. “Lucifer, you could just put a _net_ up.”

“Oh-h,” he says, “That’s what it _wants_ me to do. Nice simple solution, no sense of the punishment it deserves. That bird is a _murderer_ , Detective, and I’d like to see to it that it receives the _punishment it deserves_.”

“Yeah, but—”

They’re both abruptly distracted by the noise on the balcony.

Or, rather, two discrete noises: one that’s a lot like Michael yelling, and one that’s a lot like Big Bird when he tries to dive-bomb Chloe’s head.

Investigating confirms the following: Michael is on the balcony, and so is Big Bird. Big Bird isn’t exactly _smart_ , but it knows what Lucifer’s wings look like, and they don’t look like Michael’s. Not that Michael sticks around to explain events in detail, but judging from how Big Bird immediately tries to cozy up to Lucifer, it seems that Big Bird thinks he’s seen off a rival. Judging by how Big Bird also tries to dive-bomb Chloe again, Big Bird still thinks of Chloe as a rival as well. 

This event dissipates a little of Lucifer’s acrimony. In his words, Big Bird is still a “cockblocking bastard” (Chloe hasn’t commented on how Big Bird pretty much did the exact opposite), but at least he’s a good anti-Michael defence system. 

Michael seems to think so too: every so often, he comes by to be an asshole, but Big Bird usually only takes a few seconds of chirping “pretty bird!” before he notices the difference and starts the attack. Chloe gets the feeling that Lucifer appreciates the parrot having an intense distaste for all other angels. After a few weeks, things are almost back to normal. Michael’s not come by in ages and Big Bird’s not interrupted them again, so Lucifer is back to thinking of the parrot as a tolerable parasite.

Big Bird comes down to use the birdbath, then hops over to the feeder. Chloe’s been kind of lax at refilling it this week, so there’s not much there: Big Bird stares down despairingly at the feeder and then looks plaintively indoors. Chloe nudges Lucifer.

“Looks like _someone_ wants couple time.”

“Wh— oh, for fuck’s sake.” Lucifer grumbles his entire way to the door. “‘Couple time’,” he says disparagingly, sliding open the door as Chloe grabs the birdseed bag from inside the cabinet.. “Have you considered trying not to eat so fast, you greedy bastard?”

Big Bird chirps happily, landing on Lucifer’s shoulder. He cocks his head.

“Samael.”

Lucifer freezes up. 

Chloe frowns. “What’d it say?”

Big Bird makes an R2-D2 noise before repeating himself, nuzzling his head into Lucifer’s cheek. “Samael.”

Chloe knows that word. It’s Lucifer’s safe word, the one he came up with, but they’ve discussed it exactly _once,_ and Big Bird wouldn’t have been anywhere _near_. Lucifer’s staring somewhere into the middle distance, dangerously silent, hands balling into fists at his sides. 

Big Bird chirps again, seemingly confused by the lack of response. “Pretty—” he starts, before making another noise and cutting himself off. “ _Samael_ ,” he repeats pointedly.

“Hey, Big Bird,” Chloe says, “Time for you to go now.”

Big Bird seems to be waiting for something; he tilts his head and pecks gently at Lucifer’s cheek. “ _Samael_.”

This knocks Lucifer out of his reverie. He does it like he’s not even thinking about it, like he just wants to get the word away from him: he grabs Big Bird by his legs and throws him off the balcony. Big Bird screeches and snaps his wings out, making an upset chitter as he flaps in the air and regains balance

“Bad,” he says. “Bad, _Samael_.”

Lucifer exhales like he’s been punched. He takes a step backwards, turns on his heel, and strides into the penthouse, away to the bedroom. Chloe stares at Big Bird. She fills his feeder, and then walks off the balcony, slamming the door behind her in case the macaw tries to follow. It calls after Lucifer the entire time.

When the door slides shut, and the cries of ‘Samael’ are blocked out, the penthouse is silent.

* * *

From Lucifer’s lengthy experience with his twin brother, Michael has a lack of subtlety, but patience in spades. Michael _would_ be the one to do this: to painstakingly train an animal to chant ‘Samael’ at him like a chorus.

It’s not an especially refined move, but it doesn’t have to be. Michael knows how to get under his skin, to stay there like a needle digging deep. 

What makes it truly painful, the way Michael wouldn’t know: Lucifer had _started_ to tell her. He’d introduced her to the word, away from any personal context: he’d let the word cross his lips in her presence. It wasn’t much, but it was a start. He so rarely got the luxury of choosing how to reveal himself to Chloe: he’d wanted this to be something he told her, when he was brave enough, when the time felt right.

He splashes water on his face until the angry glitter of red fades from his irises. He stares at himself in the mirror, a hollow fury thrumming in his chest.

A knock on the door.

“Hey. No rush, but. You okay?”  
  
“I’m fine,” he says, straightening. He readies himself. This is going to be a long night. He's learned not to assume that everything Chloe sees of him will lead to an immediate break up, but there's a difference between knowing that your partner fell from grace and knowing that your partner was poison from the _moment_ he came into being. He doesn't want her to see him differently, but he knows it's inescapable.

He opens the door, smiling at her wide and false, making a pantomime of stretching and walking to the walk-in wardrobe. She follows him, silent. He can hear her thinking. He hates it. She silently follows his lead and undresses as he undresses, pulling on sleepwear as he puts on some boxers, all the while silent, glancing at him from the corner of her eye. He’s losing his nerve. She needs to ask him or he’s not going to get a single word out.

She hovers by the bed. He sits on it. Something about this makes her speak.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

He sighs. “I should probably start by saying that―"

“―Lucifer." 

He looks at her. She stares him down.

"Do you _want_ to talk about it?"

Every day, without fail, she reminds him why she's the best person he knows. The closest he'll ever be to someone else.

"...Not right now," he admits, the weight of fear resettling on his shoulders. He considers how long he can leave this without it tearing him apart. "...Tomorrow morning? Perhaps?"

“Okay," she says. She lifts the covers and slides under with him. He pulls her close, running a hand over her waist and sliding his thumb against the curve of her hip. She nuzzles her face into his neck, before stilling.

"Hey, Lucifer?"

"Yes?"

"...Do you mind getting your wings out?"

"Oh. If you'd like―"

He starts to sit back and give himself space, but she stills him midway with a hand on his chest. Her eyes are incisive as scalpels, cutting to the quick of him.

"The face too," she says.

It's not never, but he can count the times she's asked for this on a single hand. It still sends a thrill of adrenaline down his spine.

"All of it?"

"Please."

He swallows. "Very well."

Lucifer balls up the old fear that she'll look at him and run screaming, and he pushes it down as far as it'll go. He sits up and closes his eyes. He lets his anger and self-hatred and despair break over the dam.

These wings, stretched and batlike and featherless, still horrify him. He's still disgusted by himself when he looks down to see pitted red skin and distorted bone. It is a little easier to face, each and every time, when Chloe looks him in the eye and then reaches for him.

She draws Lucifer down, directs him silently to lie with his face next to hers, to wrap her in his wings. Every time before this one, a request for his Devil side has immediately led to sex, so he's surprised when she instead wriggles closer to his chest, settling down in her cocoon of sheets and wings, calm eyes searching over his body in the dark.

Chloe strokes her hand up and down the membrane of his wing. These wings aren't profoundly sensitive, but the calm and unhurried petting is… it's pleasant. Calming. She's relaxed in his hold, her fingers trailing gently across his skin.

"Thank you," she says. 

He expects her to say something else, perhaps explain why she's thanking him, perhaps say _anything_ about why she's asked for this, but she does not. She lies in his arms and strokes his wing, and he wants to protest that there's something just plain _odd_ about wanting to spend time with him like this without any motive, but it's... it's _nice_. It's a little like being groomed, in a way. 

He doesn't notice his eyes are drooping until he almost drops asleep: he jolts himself awake. Chloe smiles, kissing him gently.

"S'okay," she says. "Sleep."

He intends to change back before he does.

Just a little longer.

* * *

The next morning, after he manages to detangle his claw out of her hair again and have several bottles of something expensive, he tells her. It takes a couple hours before the words ‘Poison of God’ finally cross his lips.

Chloe tells him, with a smile on her face, that it doesn’t matter. She tells him that it changes nothing about how she sees him: that he’s _him_ , not the name he was given. He sighs in relief when he thinks she isn’t looking.

She hasn’t lied to Lucifer this profoundly since she found out he was the Devil. 

It matters to her. It matters a _lot_ . She has never before been so _blindingly_ angry at Lucifer’s father. Poison of God? _Poison of God?_ It’s like if she’d named Trixie ‘Chloe’s Disappointment’. What kind of parent does that? What kind of brother _encourages_ it? She’s thought it for a while, but this solidifies it: it’s a miracle that’s nothing to do with her, God, or any angel living, that Lucifer’s turned out as good as he is. 

For all Lucifer rails at the ‘pretty bird’ stuff, it’s not a kink for him because he hates it. Chloe doesn’t have a psych qualification, but her loose hunch has been that he enjoys the phrase so much specifically _because_ it’s kind of stupid. The fact that she’s seen him, the worst included, then given him a ridiculous pet name, is so weird to Lucifer that he’s wrapped all the way around into loving it. ‘Pretty bird’ is light-hearted and cutesy. Lucifer’s used to…

Well.

_Devil. Satan. Adversary to all Mankind._

_Poison._

There are no words for how angry she is. She remembers what Lucifer said, the day he’d started using it as a safe word. ‘Something I won’t forget and very certainly won’t say by accident’. She’s not sure if he was using ‘Samael’ as a safe word to reclaim it, or what. Now, though, Michael’s came along and found something funny and sweet in Lucifer’s life, and twisted it into a creature that waits by the window to chant ‘Samael’ at him.

She’s not the kind of person to sit on things. She goes to work the next night, shortly after Lucifer falls asleep. She arms herself accordingly by wearing Lucifer’s shirt and finagling a couple dozen oranges from behind Lux’ bar, and she slides the balcony window open and closed as fast as she dares without waking Lucifer up.

“Big Bird,” she calls softly. Wings flutter in the dark, and the macaw lands on the railing, regarding her suspiciously from a distance.

“Bad,” Big Bird says, which is either Chloe’s name or his go-to warning before he attempts to claw something to bits. She holds up an orange slice demonstratively in an open palm.

“C’mere,” she says. “Your favourite.”

She does an admirable job of not flinching when Big Bird takes flight and lands heavily on her arm. He side-steps along her forearm, talons catching on the fabric of the shirt. Big Bird snatches up the orange slice and flies back to the railing, grasping it in his claws and tearing the flesh into pulp. He sways his head as it eats, always keeping Chloe in view. She holds up the orange, slicing another piece off.

“Tha-at’s right,” she says. “We’re gonna be best friends.”

Big Bird makes a noise that could be ‘bad’ or could be the noises of a greedy parrot eating fruit. Chloe decides, for the sake of her own sanity, that this is progress.

* * *

Sunday comes all too soon. Lucifer hasn’t wanted to confront the idea of handling the balcony problem, but now he’s face-to-face with it. Chloe insists that they’ll be fine on the balcony. Lucifer has a sinking feeling that she thinks he’ll get used to the name over time, the same way he’s gotten used to her hands on his wings. He doesn’t have the heart to explain himself: he can barely articulate the problem to Linda. He grits his teeth and agrees to grooming on the balcony.

He takes a good long look at the sky before he steps out, and a longer look before he takes out his wings, but it seems the damnable creature has an ear for Chloe shutting the balcony door, because it flutters down almost instantly. He grits his teeth, pointedly ignores it, sitting down where he can slap it away with a wing if it gets too close.

Big Bird looks at Lucifer’s wings and chirps.

“Pretty bird,” it says.

Chloe’s sigh of relief is so pointed and audible that Lucifer looks at her rather than at Big Bird in his shock.

“Forty-seven oranges and probably making an enemy of your bartenders,” Chloe says. “I swear, he figured out what I wanted him to do by like, orange number _nine_ , but he’s the greediest parrot in Los Angeles.”

Big Bird flutters onto Chloe’s shoulder and nuzzles into her. Something is swelling in Lucifer’s chest.

“You _trained_ him?”

Chloe rolls her eyes. “More like I _fed_ him ‘til he did what I told him,” she admits. “I also trained him to call Michael ‘asshole’, and to bite next time, but I only had photos to go on, so I was kinda worried he was gonna mix you guys up.” Big Bird sings a phrase of the Addams Family theme tune, and she rolls her eyes again, obligingly petting its head. “Oh, yeah, now I feed you oranges, I’m your best friend? You are so shallow, you know that?.”

Lucifer stands. Big Bird crosses onto Chloe’s other shoulder, further away from him. He tamps down the roil of guilt in his stomach.

“C’mon,” Chloe prompts, getting Big Bird to hop onto her hand. “He’s not gonna hurt you, say hi.”

Big Bird nervously steps onto Lucifer’s proffered forearm, looking between Lucifer’s feathers and his face. 

“Pretty bird,” he says.

“And don’t you forget it,” Lucifer admonishes, slowly raising a hand to Big Bird’s head. Big Bird chirps happily as Lucifer pets him.

He sees Chloe taking the picture. He lets it happen. She only remembers later that she can’t distribute a picture of Lucifer with his wings out around the office, and she has to frantically delete it from her message history with Ella and Dan while he laughs at her. 

Just to make sure he stays the favourite, he starts filling the bird feeder before Chloe can. He doesn’t see her taking a picture of that. The image of him trying to juggle a cigarette, a bird, and a bag of birdseed makes it across the office before he can finish convincing Mark Zuckerberg to delete Facebook.


End file.
